The research is designed to provide information on the relationship of polymer skeletal structure, polymer chain conformation, and biological function in molecules of the polysaccharide class. Configuration-dependent solution properties of these molecules, e.g., mean square unperturbed radius of gyration, dipole moment, optical activity, are to be measured for comparison with values for these properties calculated using the statistical mechanical theory of polymer chain configuration. The theoretical calculations depend upon a chain model which embodies postulates regarding the skeletal geometry of the polymer and the potential functions which govern the conformational freedom of the skeletal units. Many details of the skeletal geometry are available from X-ray crystallographic analyses of appropriately chosen sugars and oligosaccharides. Semiempirical conformational potential functions may be used to estimate the conformational potential surface of the skeletal units. Refinement of the chain model, especially with regard to the nature and strength of interactions which influence the conformational energy surface, is carried out through efforts to achieve agreement of theoretical results with those from experiment. Success in achieving correspondence between theory and a wide variety of experimental observations can lead to a polysaccharide chain model to which one can attribute substantial physical reality and predictive capacity.